Even in its paralyzed duck period, the Trump administration is not yet ready to pursue diplomatic deals in the Middle East. In December, Morocco withdrew to normalize relations with Israel, and now Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain will end their three-and-a-half-year blockade of Qatar. If the Biden administration is wise, it will use the greater unity among America’s allies in the Middle East as a bulwark against Iran’s regional damage.
Qatar, an oil-rich nation in the Persian Gulf that hosts a U.S. air base, has been at odds with neighboring monarchies for years. In June 2017, four Arab countries announced a boycott, halting air travel and disrupting trade. Qatar was hardly an impeccable victim in the dispute, as it supported the Muslim Brotherhood and Islamic affairs in Libya and elsewhere. As we wrote at the time, the settlement might have been necessary to send a warning to Doha.
But in a new agreement signed in Saudi Arabia, and negotiated by Kuwait as well as Trump Mideast Tsar Jared Kushner, the blockade of Qatar largely comes to an end. Flights will resume between neighboring Arab states, and the countries have expressed goodwill. Trade and investment may also increase again.
It seems that the agreement seeks to patch deeper ideological rifts between Qatar and the conservative Gulf monarchies, rather than cure them. Doha has agreed to reject legal claims against the countries, but has not entered into any public obligation to curb their disruptive behavior. Yet the risk of continued divisions in the Gulf was that Qatar would drift closer to Turkey and especially Iran, with which it has a maritime border.
Some in the Biden administration may be eager to punish Saudi Arabia for the human rights record, but the move shows Riyadh is making concessions to improve stability in his environment. The Biden team has indicated that they are eager to rejoin the nuclear deal in Iran, but Tuesday’s agreement shows that the Arab monarchies are partly moving closer to balancing Iran.